


Parenthood

by Much_Ado_Abt_Novels



Category: The Mandalorian (TV)
Genre: F/F, F/M, Fluff and Smut, Multi, OC is a bottom, Polyamory, Threesome - F/F/M, because I want these two to pin me tf down
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2020-12-24
Updated: 2021-01-07
Packaged: 2021-03-10 23:21:12
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 7
Words: 10,535
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/28275246
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Much_Ado_Abt_Novels/pseuds/Much_Ado_Abt_Novels
Summary: Din Djarin and Cara Dune pick up a girl to babysit the kid and help out around the ship while they are off hunting. But joining their little crew means joining their nighttime adventures.In which the three of them learn to be parents and have lots of sex.Smut starts in chapter 3.
Relationships: Din Djarin/Cara Dune/Original Female Character(s), Din Djarin/Cara Dune/You
Comments: 17
Kudos: 44





	1. Lost and Found

**Meeshla**

A tiny green hand peeked over the edge of my stall, reaching for the finger-sized cakes that were lined up for sale. “Hey there,” I said, circling around to the front to get a look at the would-be thief. He was tiny, a child perhaps, with huge brown eyes and big ears. I looked around. “Where is your family?”

The child cooed and looked back at the cakes. Maybe he was too little to understand, or perhaps he didn’t know Basic.

I tried again in Huttese, which was commonly spoken on Lothal. “ _Where are your people?_ ”

No reply.

I poked my head into the street and looked around for anyone matching the little guy’s appearance, but saw no one. I had never seen a species like his before. Back under the tarp of my stall, I picked up the child and handed him a plain, unfrosted cake. “I don’t know what kind of creature you are, Green Bean, but if you’re like most babies, too much sugar is probably bad for you.”

He devoured it with happy munching sounds. He was freaking adorable. How were eyes that big and soulful allowed to exist?

I needed to find his parents, but the market was crowded, and I didn’t want to leave my stall unattended. I could try calling out, “Anyone lost a green baby?” But what if strangers tried to claim him for some nefarious reason? Not everyone in this sector was friendly.

I stepped into the street, bouncing Green Bean on my hip and scanning for frantic adults. What if he was an urchin and no one claimed him?

A flash of silver armor entered my vision, and a blaster was pointed at my face. “Give me the kid,” the man demanded.

I backed up, terrified, until my legs hit the table showing off my wares.

“Hand him over, now!”

Instinctively, I curled my body around the baby and held out a hand to ward off the intruder. It was a Mandalorian: a bounty hunter, by the look of him. He was flanked by a tough woman with dark hair and another gun. They descended on me with intense scowls. Well, the woman was scowling. The Mandalorian’s helmet gave off a scowling impression.

“Wait!” I said. “He just wandered in here.” What if the child was a bounty for some reason? What if these thugs wanted to kidnap him? “Please, it’s just a child!”

“Mando,” said the woman, “I think she’s a civilian who happened to pick him up.” She pointed her gun down and showed me an empty hand. “Listen, lady. We just want our kid back. He ran off, and we’ve been looking for him for ten minutes.”

“ _Your_ kid?” Neither of them looked like Green Bean. Well, the Mandalorian could have, but he would’ve had trouble squishing the ears into that helmet. “How do I know you’re telling the truth? I’m not handing a baby over to strangers who pulled blasters on me without some kind of proof of relation. What’s his name?”

“Uh,” the woman stumbled. They were both too professional to take their eyes off me, but I got the sense that they wanted to exchange glances.

That did it. “I’m calling for help,” I said.

“No, wait!” said the Mandalorian, putting the blaster away. “I call him _verd’ika_.”

The child looked up, recognizing the word, and burbled happily. I hesitated.

“He’s my kid,” Mando said. “I promise. I adopted him a few months ago. I’m sorry we scared you, but we were worried sick when we found him missing.” 

I looked down at Bean. “Is this your dad?” I asked.

He reached out his arms to Mando, a clear request to be handed over, and I did. Bean crawled immediately into a sack at Mando’s side—a ride-along spot that he was obviously comfortable in.

I relaxed marginally. I’d found his people, even if they were as strange as the little guy himself. Now I had to say goodbye, which was harder than it should have been. I’d only known him a few minutes, but that tiny fuzzy face had struck a chord in my heart.

A little cake whizzed past me, straight into Bean’s hands. He tilted his head and raised his ears as if daring me to question the _Force magic_ he had just wielded.

Mando sighed and reached into a pouch. “How much was that?”

“He, he just…” My heart stuttered as much as my words.

The woman slung her gun over her shoulder. “How would you like a drink?” she asked.

—

**Din**

We brought the girl to a nearby cantina and explained the basics. The kid had been a bounty, and we had rescued him from the Imps, who were still tracking him. She couldn’t tell anyone what she had seen if she wanted to keep him safe.

She nodded along, holding the kid in her lap as if she were still scared to let him go. Or, to let him go to us. I wanted to reassure her.

“We’re new at this parenting thing,” I admitted. “Today’s mishap was proof. But we are doing our best by him.”

She fiddled with his ears. “I bet you’re a trouble-maker,” she told him in a sweet, lilting voice. “Have you been giving your mom and dad a hard time?”

“Oh no,” Cara said with a swipe of her hand as if she were wiping something away. “It’s his kid, not mine.” She still resisted calling herself part of the family, even though she’d been traveling with us and sleeping with me since we’d met.

The woman glanced between us. “So you two aren’t…”

“We’re not exclusive,” Cara said, raising her eyebrows over her flagon. “In case you’re wondering.”

The woman blushed and ducked her head, a few curls spilling onto her face.

The kid pushed his metal ball, his favorite toy, against the woman’s lips.

She gasped and took the ball. “You want me to eat this? Okaaaaay.” She fisted and hid the toy while pretending to consume it. “Nom nom nom nom.”

The kid giggled hysterically, even more so when she “found” the toy again in his ear.

Watching her play with my child was uncomfortably erotic. She was beautiful, now that I had the chance to study her. She had deep, tanned skin, dark hair, and an expressive face. Her loose clothing hid her figure, but I got the sense that it was full of soft curves.

She met our gazes again, mostly Cara’s. People had trouble looking in my eyes when they couldn’t see them, which was great for intimidation, less so for casual conversation. “You guys need some help,” she said bravely. “You need to spend more time around children to learn how to take care of them, or else find someone to teach you. It’s understandable that you’re still getting the hang of parenting, but you can’t be doing things like carting your child around in a sack that he can easily escape from, right next to blasters and knives and whatever else is hanging from that belt.”

Cara and I exchanged looks. She had a point, but neither of us had time to learn. We needed to “get the hang of this” now, before something happened to the kid.

“Excuse me a moment,” the woman said, handing the kid back to me. I caught a glimpse of a full, round shoulder as she bent across the table and her shawl slipped down.

Cara had to be thinking along the same lines as me. As the woman walked away to use the refresher, Cara stared at her behind appreciatively.

“Do you have to flirt with every pretty girl we come across?” I asked.

“I have very specific types, Mando. Big, secretly gentle men who can sometimes manage to hold me down, and every woman to ever exist.” She took another drink. “But she’s right, you know: we do need help. We need a woman on board.”

“You’re a woman on board.”

She rolled her eyes. “I mean a mothering type. I’m an extra blaster to help you with bounties. We need someone to look after the kid while we’re gone.”

So far, we had been either leaving him alone in the ship (on short excursions), bringing him with us, or leaving one person behind to watch him. It would be extremely helpful to have another adult designated to stay with him and babysit. We could take longer and more dangerous jobs, which meant higher-paying ones.

“Look,” Cara continued, “she may not be a trained fighter, but we already have two of those, and we know she’ll stand up for the kid. She faced down two ugly-ass mercenaries five minutes after meeting him.”

“All right,” I said. “Ask her.”

“Really?” She hadn’t expected me to concede this easily.

“Yeah. You make some good points, and I’d prefer bringing this girl over trying to advertise for the position.”

The woman returned and sat back down.

“What’s your name?” I asked.

“Meeshla,” she said.

“Beautiful.” The word escaped before I could think to hold it in. Her name sounded like the Mando’a word for beautiful.

“Thank you,” she said, smiling at me shyly.

“Listen,” Cara said, leaning forward and touching Meeshla’s arm, lowering her voice. “We want you to join our crew as a caretaker for the kid. You wouldn’t be an employee; you’d be a partner. You’d get an even share of the credits we make.” She stroked the girl’s skin gently, letting her know that ‘partner’ was insinuative.

“You, you want me to fly away with you to be a nanny?” Meeshla asked.

“Like you said,” I told her, “we need help. You like the kid. He likes you. You’re good with him.”

As if in response, the kid burbled at her. I hoped his adorableness would help convince her.

“And,” she flickered her eyes between us, “just to be clear, you want me to be…”

“We both want to sleep with you,” Cara said bluntly. Of course she knew what I was thinking; she could read me well by this point, even with the helmet. “Not immediately, unless you want. Not until you’re ready.”

“When are you leaving?” Meeshla asked. “I would need to make arrangements, close up my stall.”

“Then you’ll come?” I sat up straighter, almost unable to believe she’d agreed.

“I don’t have much of a life here, to be honest. Adventuring with you lot sounds exciting, especially if I get to adventure without having to go out for the dangerous bits. And I love your little one. I’d be happy to take care of him while you’re off capturing criminals or whatever it is you do.”

“We can hang around here a few more days while you pack,” Cara said, glancing at me for confirmation. I nodded. “We got our bounty already, so we can even help you wrap up whatever you need to.”

She smiled brilliantly, glancing my way to let me catch a little of her light.

I made a mental note to thank Cara for this later.


	2. The Beginning

**Cara**

Meeshla ordered us around like pit droids. We helped her pack up her unsold wares in shrink-wrapped packages that would keep them fresh longer. Her stall sold all manner of baked goods, from hard candies to sheets of flaky dough wrapped around steaming meat. We passed the most perishable items around to the flood of urchins and ragged adults who somehow got wind of the free food. Meeshla knew many of them by name. It wouldn’t surprise me if this weren’t the first time she’d slipped them freebies.

I groaned when I sampled some of her food. “This is phenomenal. Mando, I’ll bring some back to the ship for you. You’ve got to try it.”

Meeshla glanced at Din, who was packing away her utensils and instruments and shit. “Do you not take off the helmet around people?”

“Not in public,” he replied. “I do around those I’m close to and comfortable with.”

“Fuck him once, and he’ll be tearing it off,” I advised Meeshla with a smirk.

Din tilted his helmet at the angle that meant “exasperation,” but I noticed that he didn’t argue.

“So, anyway,” Meeshla said, “I cook, too. I can also make and mend clothes and some shoes.”

“You’re already coming. It’s a done deal,” I said. “You don’t need to keep selling us on you.” And if she kept talking about her kriffing cute homemaking skills, I was liable to wife her up on the spot.

It didn’t take long to store up or pass out everything from the stall. Her things were meant to be portable so she could bring them home and back. “Okay,” she told us. “If you guys could bring that stuff over to your ship, I’ll inform the woman I’m renting the stall from that I’m leaving. You can meet me at my home to get the rest of my stuff.” She gave us directions so we could get to it.

We brought the boxes from the stall back to the _Crest_ and then headed over to her house to pack up clothes and other necessities. Her home was tiny and neat. She would do well on a ship. Two more trips moved everything she was bringing onto the _Crest_ ; she was donating what wouldn’t fit.

Then she stood around, biting her lip.

“What?” Din asked.

“There’s a man in town who owes me some money. Could you come with me to ask him for it? I think one look at you two, and he’ll just hand the credits over.”

Din and I exchanged looks, and then he slung his rifle into his hands. “I think we can manage that,” he said.

Gringarth the merchant, as expected, gave Meeshla no trouble as Din and I loomed on either side of her like bodyguards. He forked over the credits in record time, apologizing for having kept her waiting.

There was a spring in her step as she exited the room.

—

“Where to next?” I asked Din after Meeshla was all moved in.

“Saleucami. The next bounty is hiding out there.” He started up the ladder to the cockpit.

Meeshla stood around like she didn’t know what she should be doing. “Can I come up and watch the liftoff?” she asked.

“Sure.”

I took the baby from her because I knew I could climb the ladder holding him. We all ascended, and Meeshla and I strapped into the two extra seats set back behind the pilot’s.

“Should I take him?” Meeshla asked, reaching for the baby. “It’s my job, after all.”

I held on. “You’ll get to take care of him plenty when we’re gone. Don’t you worry.”

Meeshla looked out the window with barely-contained excitement, chatting. “I’ve only been to space a few times.”

I was used to relative silence aboard the _Crest_. Din wasn’t a sparkling conversationalist. Did he prefer the quiet, or did he just not know what to say? But Meeshla was talking, and I was happy to talk back. “You’ll be in space a lot, now,” I said. “The galaxy’s a big place, and it takes a while to travel.”

“This should be a shorter trip,” Din added. “A few hours at most.”

I was shocked that he’d engaged with us without being asked a direct question.

He flipped switches and pressed buttons, powering up the engines one at a time and preparing for launch. “Hold on.” The craft rose, accelerating as we left the ground behind.

Meeshla was wide-eyed and grinning.

“Do you know how to fly?” Din asked her.

“No, sorry.”

“Don’t apologize. I’ll teach you one of these days. You need to know in case you have to make an emergency escape with the kid.” He flicked another switch and pushed a lever forward. “Making the jump to hyperspace…now.”

Meeshla’s eyes glittered in the rushing blue light. She made a soft noise of appreciation that I wondered if I could get her to make again.

Where we landed on Saleucami, it was early morning, and I offered Meeshla some advice. “Don’t try to force your sleep schedule to conform to whatever planet we’re on unless we plan to stay for a while. Every planet has days of different length, and when we aren’t hopping from one to the next as fast as we just did, we’re traveling through hyperspace, where nothing like day and night exist. The ship’s circadian lights can help you keep a regular cycle if you’re interested. Otherwise, just sleep when you’re tired.”

“Thank you,” she said. “I’ll keep that in mind.”

We introduced her to the ship before we left on the next hunt. There wasn’t much to see. Most of the ship’s interior, excepting the cockpit, was one long, open room in the hull, designated loosely into sections based on what hung on the walls: carbonite bounties, armory, food storage, plastoid crates of supplies. The refresher and the cot were side by side under the cockpit, both with doors that could close them off from the hull.

“This main cot sleeps one,” I explained. “It’s pretty cramped, so we usually sleep on this.” I pulled down the larger cot from the wall, which Din had installed at my arrival. Sweet of him. “It sleeps two. It might hold three if you don’t mind a little crowding.” I winked at Meeshla. “For now, you can take the main cot for some privacy.”

She looked between the two beds, then over at Din, who was leaned stoically against the armory doors. “That sounds great. Maybe I’ll work up the courage to join you soon. Where does the baby sleep?”

“He has a floating pram around here somewhere… There it is.” I dragged it closer. “If he isn’t in a cuddling mood, he sleeps in here. We also use it to cart him around on errands.”

Meeshla had more questions about the baby: when he slept, what he ate, where his toys were.

“Uh,” I started, suddenly realizing that he didn’t really have any. Damn, we were terrible at this.

“He has that ball thing that he took from my console,” Din said, as if that should be enough.

Meeshla stared at us, stuck somewhere between laughing and yelling in frustration. She finally blinked a few times, calming down, and took the baby from my arms like she no longer trusted us anywhere near him. I couldn’t blame her, really. “Okay,” she said. “Next time we head to a town for supplies, I’m going to get some things for him to play with. Anything else I should know?”

“He’s fifty years old,” I said.

“We don’t actually know his name,” Din added.

Meeshla closed her eyes.

—

**Din**

Meeshla was a welcome addition to the crew. She was bright and cheerful, full of endless patience for the child’s antics. And she talked all the goddamn time, which should have bothered me. I hated when bounties ran their mouths. But listening to her lifted my chest like I’d inhaled something floaty. She narrated her actions to the kid, spoke to him endlessly, and engaged in little mock-conversations with him where she would speak, then listen to his excited babble, then speak back as if she’d understood what he’d said.

I often left the cockpit door open so I could listen.

She eased up on the chatter when I entered the room. I hoped she wasn’t still intimidated by me, though I hadn’t done much to allay her suspicion. Today, she was playing with the kid on the floor, draping a blanket over his head and tearing it off to his surprise and delight.

“Don’t stop,” I said, sitting on one of the nearby crates to watch. I disassembled and cleaned a blaster to give me an excuse to be there.

“So, is not having a name a thing in your family?” she asked.

“I’m Din. Din Djarin. Please don’t use that name outside the _Crest_ or in front of strangers.”

“Of course.”

The baby clearly thought she had ignored him for too long, and he reached for the blanket to keep playing.

She whipped it over his whole, small body, asking, “Where’d he go? Where is my little Green Bean?” Then she pulled it back and gasped in complete elation over having found him. “THERE you are!”

I smiled despite myself, safely hidden by the helmet.

“You know,” she said in a less-babyish voice, and I knew she was speaking to me, “he really needs more toys and things to do. Otherwise he’s going to tear apart your ship looking for stuff to play with.”

“You’re right. I was thinking in a week or two I’d give him his first blaster.”

She gaped at me in abject horror.

“I’m kidding. Sorry, just a joke.” I had meant to shock her, but not so much.

She laughed in relief and went back to playing. The kid pulled the blanket over himself, and she gave a mournful whine. “He’s _gone_ again! Vanished! Din, I lost your child!” She met my gaze. “Would you help me look for him?”

I didn’t want to interrupt them. They were having so much fun alone, and I didn’t want to ruin it. But she was offering me a clear invitation. So I set aside the blaster pieces, knelt on the ground, and tried to mimic her playfulness as I rooted through the blanket’s folds. “Where did he go? Where is he?”

The little guy burst out of hiding and into my lap, noisily happy.

That weightless feeling in my chest was back.

Meeshla smiled at the kid, enamored.

I stared at her lips, wondering if it was too soon to rip my helmet off and kiss her.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Hope you guys are enjoying the fluff and cuteness. Don't worry, our lovely OC will be railed into the next parsec soon. <3


	3. Started Without Me?

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Please let me know what you think of this story! Comments make this awful year a little brighter.

**Meeshla**

I had been on board for two weeks now. The experience of living on a ship was still thrilling and novel, even if conditions were a little cramped. The baby kept me busy, especially when Cara and Din were off hunting bounties. When they returned, immediately after freezing whatever poor soul had the misfortune of being their quarry, they usually reached out tired hands for Green Bean.

I considered their offer to sleep with them, wondering if I were ready to cross that bridge.

Then one night, sealed away in my bunk, I overheard them going at it. Soft moans filtered through the closed door, then Cara shushed Din, whispering, “She’s gonna hear!”

“Let her,” he replied. “Maybe she’ll join in. You’d like that, wouldn’t you? Like her soft thighs clamped around your head?”

Cara moaned.

I considered their offer even harder after that. But how was I supposed to bring it up? Just come right out and say, ‘I’ve been thinking about fucking you guys, and you said you wanted me to, so here I am—do with me what you will’?

I saw an opportunity one night when my two crewmates went out to trade for some foodstuffs in the nearby town. They’d promised to be back just after dark.

“Thank you, thank you, thank you,” I told Bean when he settled down without a fuss, clutching the stuffed frog I made him. There was no way I was having sex while Bean was awake. I closed his pram. Then I slipped into my nightgown, pulled down the larger cot, and laid down.

I didn’t mean to doze off, but suddenly I was waking up to Din taking off his ammo belt and gloves, looking down at me.

“You’re in our bed,” Din observed, observantly.

“It appears so. Where’s Cara?”

“On her way.” He continued removing pieces of armor and heavy outerwear, slowly, deliberately.

At the cot’s height, my face was just several handspans from Din’s bulge, and I tried not to stare at it. Was he even human? What would it look like?

“What are you doing there?” he asked like he was making sure he was reading the situation correctly.

“I was hoping I could sleep with you.” I couldn’t meet his visor’s gaze as I said it, too embarrassed.

“Sleep with me? Or Cara? Or both of us?”

“Yes,” I said.

He chuckled. He walked around and slid into bed behind me.

I buried my head in my arms, burning up. My right leg was bent and my left stretched out so that I lay nearly facedown. When Din’s hand brushed the back of my leg, I jolted, breathing heavily.

“I like this little nightdress,” he said. “Like that I can just push it up and touch you.” His hand trailed up under it, encountering my pussy. A rough breath rattled through his voice modulator. “You’re not wearing anything underneath. And you’re wet as Kamino.”

I felt the warmth of his body as he scooted closer. It was finally, finally happening. When I first met Din, I had been terrified, but I had grown familiar with the sweet man under all that beskar—the hardened warrior who was trying so hard to be a good father.

“Tell me you want this,” he whispered.

“I want it if you do.”

“Since the day we met.” He dragged two fingers over my sex, zigzagging them like a winding river. “Since watching how good you are with the kid. Since this morning, when you tied back your hair with that scarf.” Din teased my folds, slipping one finger gently through, then two, then circling around my clit without touching it.

I wiggled against his hand, seeking more contact.

“Needy.” But he sounded pleased.

I rolled my hips more insistently. If that made me needy, then fine.

Din took pity on me and started rubbing in earnest, applying the pressure that I so desperately craved. His fingers were broad and their movements firm; he knew what he was doing.

I was content to let him work me with his hands as long as he wished. When he was ready to fuck me, I trusted that he would.

Din inserted one thick finger, curling it inside me until I moaned.

My legs slid apart a little in an unconscious reaction. Another finger, thrusting in and out, and then a thumb rubbing quickly on my clit had me coming all over his hand.

Din had one leg between mine, body covering me, before I had time to recover. But just then, the ramp hissed open, and he reached for a nearby weapon before relaxing at the sight of Cara.

She let her sack drop from her shoulders, hitting the metal floor with a soft thud. “You started without me?”

“I’m sorry!” I said, unsure how offended she was.

She shook her head and clicked her tongue, advancing until she stood in front of my face. For several moments, she took in the scene. Then she raised an eyebrow at Din. “I would’ve at least thought you’d have her naked by now.”

“You are so right.” He pulled me up so that I knelt with my back to him, and he lifted my nightgown over my head.

Cara slid her hands up my stomach to cup my breasts. “Such perfect tits.”

Din gripped my behind. “Such a pretty little ass.”

I felt vulnerable, on display for them, but I kind of liked it. They seemed to like me.

Cara started stripping while Din dragged his hands down my thighs, then back up to feel my breasts, thumbing my nipples. Cara knelt on the bed with us once she was naked. She took my hips from Din and kissed me. His weight disappeared from behind me, and I heard him undressing.

It seemed I’d been passed over to Cara, and I didn’t mind. Her body was a pleasing mixture of soft and hard—her muscular arms kept me locked in place exactly where she wanted me, and her breasts pressed against mine. Her mouth was warm and firm and…

Din’s unclothed erection pressed against my ass. “Can I fuck you?” he asked.

I tried to pull away to answer, but Cara chased my mouth. “Umph. Yes,” I managed to squeak out.

He pushed his dick between my legs, dragging it along my slit to get it nice and wet.

I moaned.

Cara guided my hand between her thighs and started mouthing my neck with warm, torturous movements. Her pussy was already soaked when I started fingering her.

Din nudged my legs apart a little more and entered me in a long, slow thrust that split me open and made me throw back my head against his shoulder. When he was fully seated, he began to _grind_ his hips into mine.

I was wholly supported by the two of them, tethered to reality by a single, gossamer thread. It was all I could do to keep thrusting my fingers inside Cara as they both overwhelmed me with sensation. There were so many hands touching me, so much skin. Cara’s lips brushed the place my jaw met my neck, and I shuddered.

Cara came first, as I clung to her back with my free hand and skimmed my nails across her shoulder. Her body tensed beautifully, powerfully, and she released a delicious cry of ecstasy.

Din thrust into me harder. “Can I come in you?” he asked. “I have the implant.”

“Yes, please.”

“Not until she does, Din,” Cara said, flicking my clit.

Din groaned.

I concentrated on his heavy breathing, his thick cock ramming into me again and again, the hair on his strong thighs, his hands holding me still. Then Cara unexpectedly licked my clit and blew on it, and I was coming, bearing down on Din and choking on my moans as pleasure rippled through me.

Din spilled inside me in an instant, hips stuttering. His cum leaked down my thigh as he pulled out his softening dick.

Cara laid down next to us, and we all shifted to fit. I wound up draped half over her with Din at my back. They both traced patterns over my skin. I closed my eyes, more content than I had felt in a long time.

“How are you so _soft_?” Din asked.

“No muscle,” I offered.

“No scars,” Cara said. “Just long, smooth planes of skin.”

“Do you forgive me for starting without you?” Din asked.

“Hm. I will if you let me at her first next time. I’m going to spread her out and worship her cunt for hours.”

I fell asleep under their caresses.


	4. Part of the Crew

**Din**

Meeshla woke slowly, stretching and turning several times, nudging me awake in the process. Did we need to install a larger bed? Frankly, I didn’t mind the closeness. I liked Meeshla’s little huffs of breath and the bump of her limbs against mine.

She finally opened her eyes, then sat up, rubbing her eyes. She absorbed the sight of Cara and me tangled in the sheets around her. “Did you sleep in that helmet?” she asked me.

“Yes.” Hopefully, I wouldn’t have to for much longer. I would wait a little to make sure she was okay with what had gone down between us, and if she still wished to stick around, I would take it off.

“Is the baby awake yet?”

“Believe me, you would know,” groaned Cara.

“Come here, _mesh’la_ ,” I said, opening my arms. I wanted to hold her.

She crawled on top of me, resting her head on my chest and curling her hand around my side. She was warm and pliant.

I exhaled deeply and closed my eyes. For once, there was peace, a moment of comfort.

Cara was more alert now, shrugging off the dregs of sleep. “What’s going on over there?” she asked. “Are you two getting it on again?”

Meeshla twitched and inhaled. Cara must’ve touched her.

“We’re just laying here, Cara,” I said. “Relax.”

Meeshla was yanked out of my loose grip and turned onto her back. Cara crawled over her. “I believe I made you a promise that Din wouldn’t touch you again until I’d eaten my fill of that pussy.”

“That’s not what you said!” I protested, but Meeshla looked so enraptured in Cara’s caresses that I didn’t have the heart to interrupt and pull her back. We shouldn’t have been fighting over her like children who wanted the same toy. Even if my urge was to chide Cara with an infantile ‘I had her first!’

I rolled onto my side and watched, semi-hard, as Cara shifted down Meeshla’s body and kissed teasingly around her legs. Then she twisted her tongue through Meeshla’s folds, and the other woman sank into the mattress like suddenly released of all tension.

The kid started crying.

Cara raised her mouth enough to speak teasingly. “That’s your son, Din. And we’re busy.”

Meeshla reached to push her away. “No, I can—”

“I’ll take it,” I said. “Just enjoy yourself.” I pressed my forehead to hers in a quick _kov’nyn_ before pulling on some pants and going to find my son.

—

Later, after charting a course through hyperspace, I descended from the cockpit to find the bed stored and everyone dressed, much to my dismay. Cara sat in the corner sipping caf and reading from a holopad. Meeshla was sorting through our food stores, the kid on her hip. He grabbed at her curls, entranced, and she let him.

I cleared my throat. Now was as good a time as any. “Can I speak with you, _mesh’la_?”

She turned, an exasperated smile on her face. “Sure, but it’s MEE-shla, not MAY-shla.”

I stepped closer. “I know your name. ‘ _Mesh’la_ ’ means ‘beautiful’ in Mando’a.”

“Oh. _Oh._ ” She blushed.

“Yes, he’s _very_ romantic,” Cara said.

“Can you not do this right now?” I snapped at her.

“I’m sorry.” Cara didn’t sound sorry in the slightest. “You’re just so easy to get a rise out of.” She sipped her caf. “In more ways than one.”

I glared at her, then returned my attention to Meeshla. “Anyway, I wanted to see how you were doing after last night. Did we make you uncomfortable in any way?”

“Not at all! I,” she looked at the ground, “really enjoyed it.”

“Then, you would like to remain on this crew with us? You’re happy here?”

“Very much. I love this little guy, I like hanging out with you and Cara, and I liked last night a lot.” She shot Cara a smile. “And this morning.”

I nodded. “All right, then.” I reached for my helmet and lifted it off, setting it aside.

“I told ya,” came Cara’s smug voice from the corner. “Sleep with him once.”

I whipped toward her, used to having to turn my whole body to put something in my sights. “It’s not just that,” I defended myself. “She’s been here for two weeks. She says she wants to stay. I’d say that makes her part of the crew, don’t you?”

“Din,” Meeshla breathed. Her hand touched my cheek, guiding me back to face her.

Right. She would want a good long look the first time. I made an effort not to close my eyes under her scrutiny.

Meeshla’s soft fingers explored the contours of my cheek, my nose, as her eyes darted around. Then she pulled back, suddenly shy. She chuckled. “I didn’t expect you to be so handsome.”

“I like the fact that he takes the time to shave a mustache even though no one ever sees it,” said Cara.

I raised my eyebrows at her. “You see it.”

“Yes, but you had it even before you took off the helmet for me, didn’t you?”

I had no reply to that.

Cara stood and walked around Meeshla to hug her and the kid from behind. “Now that you’re officially one of us, you get to sit on my face and roast Din whenever your little heart desires.” Cara kissed her cheek. “Welcome to the crew.”

—

**Meeshla**

Din kissed me after I’d put the baby to bed that evening, and then he couldn’t seem to keep his mouth off me. He kissed my neck, sucking marks onto the most sensitive parts of my skin, trailing downward until my tunic got in the way. “Take your clothes off,” he murmured.

Cara yanked him to the side to kiss her, helping him out of his trousers.

I hurried to get undressed as fast as them, pulling off my loose pants and top, as well as unwrapping the band of cloth around my chest.

All naked in record time, Cara slid behind Din and guided him back to me. She kissed his spine while taking his cock in hand.

Din kissed me hard, desperately, licking into my mouth. He grabbed Cara’s hand to still her. “Too dry,” he growled.

“Easy fix.” Cara trailed her fingers up Din’s chest until she held her palm in front of his mouth. He kept eye contact with me while he licked a stripe up it. 

Then he was back to fucking her hand and devouring my mouth.

I could never have imagined myself here, with two people such as them. I was nobody, and they were fearsome warriors with custody of a Force-sensitive child. They were main characters in a galactic story I had no place in.

But I felt like I did when they were kissing me.

The three of us stumbled to the bed—the simple task made difficult from our disinclination to keep our hands off one another. Cara pushed Din onto his back on the large cot and guided me to sit facing her, both of us straddling his hips. She kissed me with a hand tangled in my hair.

Din slid his hands over my ass and up my back, which were turned toward his face. “One of you, please.”

Cara grasped his dick, erect between us. “I don’t know. Should we give him what he wants?”

I was too busy kissing her breast to reply. Her body was thick, like mine, but her muscle shaped it differently. I loved exploring her curves.

Cara took pity on the man under us and slid onto his cock, moaning. She and Din must’ve had the same idea because they simultaneously pushed and pulled me until I hovered over his face.

I loved when they individually forced me around, and I loved when they did it together even more.

Din kissed my pussy as Cara began to ride him. “Haven’t gotten to taste you yet,” he said. “Been thinking about it.” His stubble ticked as he mashed his face into the apex of my thighs, swirling his tongue delightfully. He squeezed my legs with large hands.

“She’s good, isn’t she?” Cara said.

“ _Yes_.” He sucked my clit into his mouth before releasing it and laving over the spot.

I whimpered, trying to keep my balance. Trying to keep from grinding down too hard on his face and smothering him. I watched Cara bouncing, Din’s hips rising a little to meet her each time she descended. Dark hair curled down Din’s chest to the base of his cock. I wanted to take him in my mouth until my nose touched it.

Din was working me to my peak faster than I’d thought possible. He should have taken off the helmet sooner; we should have done this days ago.

“Stop pulling away from me,” he ordered, tugging my legs down harder.

“Don’t you need to breathe?”

“No.” He held me against his mouth and worked me faster until I gave in and rocked against him. Another moment, then two, and then I was crying out and coming—light and heat flashed through my vision even though my eyes were closed. Din’s firm grip kept me grounded as the aftershocks rippled through me, their blindingness fading in pulses.

Din released me, and I slid to the side so he could focus on Cara. I watched, content, as they grunted and moved together.

“Come on, Din. I can feel that you’re close,” Cara said.

His knee shifted up a bit as his muscles worked. His lips were glossy, raunchy, his lovely face tense with exertion. Then he groaned, and I got to see every tiny expression as his orgasm swept through. His mouth parted. His eyebrows furrowed. Half-lidded eyes glanced from Cara, to the ceiling, and back to her. 

She huffed, her breath quick, then seemed to stop breathing for several moments as the muscles in her legs clenched, and then her breath came back with a long, shaky sigh.

“Did you come?” Din asked.

“Yes.” Cara bent over to kiss him, and I caught a flash of tangling tongues. Din slid his hands up her neck and into her hair. Cara pulled back and smirked. “You taste like Meeshla.”


	5. I Can Sew

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Someone asked what Meeshla looked like, so I drew a quick picture of how I imagine her.

**Cara**

“Son of a nerf-herder!” I yelled. The blaster bolt had grazed my side, slicing through my top and several layers of skin. I fired off a few rounds in reply and then ducked behind an overturned table for cover.

“Are you hit?” Din asked from a few feet away. He was turned sideways to fit his bulk behind a pillar.

“Just a flesh wound, but I’d appreciate it if we could get out of here sometime soon.”

“Right.” Din dashed to my table, taking a shot at our enemies as he went. Crouched down now, he grabbed the huddled bounty whose wrists were cuffed behind his back. Din put a blaster to his head. “Call off your guards.”

“You shouldn’t kill me,” said the Twi’lek man. “I’m worth more alive than dead.”

“You’re right.” Din shifted the blaster down so its muzzle pointed at the Twi’lek’s knee. “But a couple of shattered kneecaps won’t kill you.”

He lurched back in fear. “All right, all right! Men,” he shouted. “Stand down!”

The blaster fire ceased.

Din, the bounty, and I pulled back out of the wattle-and-daub dwelling and onto the street, then we rode borrowed speeders back to the _Crest_. The bounty was sullen and silent, which worked for me. I needed to focus on driving with an arm pressed to my side to staunch the bleeding.

Din lowered the ramp with a command from his vambrace, then hauled the bounty into the ship by the scruff of his shirt. “Get the med-pack,” he ordered Meeshla as he pushed the bounty into the carbonite chamber and froze him.

She dumped the baby into a hammock strung up in the corner and ran for the pack.

Din helped ease me to the ground. “Are you only hurt on your side?” He pulled up my shirt enough to see the cut.

“Just the side, yeah.” I winced. This wasn’t the worst injury I’d ever suffered, but it did hurt like a loth cat’s claws.

Meeshla slid to our side on her knees, thrusting the med-pack at Din. Her eyes and hair were wild. Had she ever seen a blaster wound before?

Din was in his quick, methodical version of a panic. He ripped open my shirt to expose the cut. Then he cleaned the skin with precise wipes of a bacta swab. “It’s not too deep, but it needs to be sealed to heal properly.” He grabbed the cauterizer from the med-pack and flipped it on. It hummed like a harbinger of doom.

“No!” I shied back. “Get that fucking thing away from me, Din! Just because you like to fry yourself to avoid dealing with injuries doesn’t mean everyone does. I don’t want to end up looking like your scarred, lumpy ass.”

He clicked the cauterizer off, annoyance seeping through the helmet. “What do you propose we do?”

“Can the kid heal me?”

“No. I don’t want him to expend himself unless it’s an emergency. This cut isn’t life-threatening.”

“Then sew it up and be done with it.” I pressed a gauze pad to my side, keeping pressure on it. Fuck, it hurt.

“I don’t sew wounds well. I’m sorry.” He did sound genuinely apologetic. It must’ve been embarrassing to admit a flaw in his super, ancient Mandalorian warrior abilities.

I just wanted this to be over. “Fine. I’ll do it.”

But he was already shaking his head. “The cut is on your side and back. You won’t be able to reach it without twisting around. You can’t even see all of it.”

Meeshla spoke up in a timid voice. “I can sew.”

Din and I looked at her, having just remembered she was there. “Have you ever sewn up a flesh wound?” Din asked.

“No, but I’ve used curved needles before.”

It was a risk to let a novice take a needle to my skin, but this option was still preferable to Din’s go-to ‘Just burn your flesh back together’ solution. Maybe Meeshla would get queasy after a stitch or two and change her mind, but at least she could get a couple done before I took over. “Okay, let’s give it a shot.”

Our crewmate tied back her hair and washed her hands, and then Din made room for her so she could access my side. She threaded the medical needle from the med-pack. “Do I sew it in one long line or tie off and cut individual stitches?”

“Whatever you’d prefer,” I said.

“I want to do it right.”

“Then make individual stitches not connected to each other,” Din said. “That’s probably better.”

Meeshla nodded, as cool and confident as I had ever seen her. She got to work with a determined focus. She never wavered—even as I cursed at the pain—tying neat, careful knots across my wound.

Din took over when the final stitch was tied, smoothing bacta along the cut and wrapping a bandage around my waist. He praised Meeshla’s work. “You handled that impressively.”

“You’re surprised?” she asked shakily, her confidence failing now that the task was complete. “So am I. Can I… I’m going to go clean up.” She got to her feet in a movement like a slow scramble, then retreated to the fresher, closing the door behind her. Water ran—she was washing her hands.

Din took off the helmet with a sigh. “Are you all right?”

“I’m fine. Stop hovering. I just want to get some rest.”

He nodded. Din was surprisingly soft and considerate with injured crewmates. How would he react if precious Meeshla ever got hurt? “I’m going to set a course for Nevarro. Let me help you into bed. Do you want the big cot or the small one?”

“The big one for sure. You and Meeshla can have some close-quarters quality time together while I spread out and heal my wounded body in luxury.”

He didn’t argue, just snorted and lifted me onto the larger cot.


	6. Close Quarters

**Meeshla**

“We’re squeezing into the tiny cot tonight,” Din told me, “because Cara is being dramatic.” His words weren’t friendly, but I could tell that he didn’t mean any derision. He was relieved that Cara was doing okay and was showing his affection through teasing.

Cara made a rude gesture in his general direction, eyes closed.

“It’s a minor blaster wound,” he said to her. “It barely scraped you. If I took a day off every time I got shot, I would never work.”

“Lucky for you, we have a day to waste anyway because we finished this batch of bounties.”

“Lucky for _you_ , more like it,” Din replied. “I would have dragged you off your ass and on the next mission if we had one.”

Their banter put me at ease. Everything was okay. I had sewed up a wound for the first time in my life, and it had turned out fine.

I busied myself by fixing dinner as usual, trying to calm my nerves. I hadn’t even been the one shot! Did I really belong here if the sight of a little blood completely threw me? “All right,” I announced, “we have rehydrated bread, which I toasted a little, and I made a sauce for the protein cubes.” Din took his portion with a word of thanks, and I sat on the edge of Cara’s bed, handing over hers.

“Come here.” Din picked up Green Bean and set him on his lap. “Meeshla, can he eat this?”

“I have plain cubes for him without the sauce, but you can give him a piece to see if he likes it.”

Din cut one cube into smaller pieces and fed a bite to the baby, who then reached for more. “That’s what I thought,” Din said with satisfaction. “He’s the child of a Mandalorian; he can handle spicy food.”

“Mandalorians like spice?” I asked. I had sort of worked out Din’s taste preferences by now, but I was intrigued to know if it was a personal or cultural thing.

“Oh yeah,” said Cara. “The lot of them are on drugs all the time.”

Din sent one of his pointed glares to Cara, somehow conveying the exact expression of his helmet. “We like _spices_. Rich, hearty food that will sustain you while fighting.”

“And your kid likes frogs,” Cara said. “Well-developed palates, you all have.”

I smiled. Then I noticed that Din was trying to feed himself and the baby at the same time, and Bean was giving him trouble, reaching for more and nearly spilling the bowl on the floor. “Want some help?” I asked.

“Thank you, but I’m fine. This is part of the joys of single parenting.”

“You’re not a single parent, Din,” I said, scooping Bean’s serving from the pot into Din’s bowl.

He stared up at me with an unknown expression that made me blush. He was too kriffing handsome to be looking at me like that.

I tried to lighten the mood with a joke. “I mean, I’ll keep acting like your wife as long as the pay is good.”

He chuckled. “Oh, well that makes me feel excellent about this relationship dynamic, how about you, Cara?”

She stuffed her face with bread. “Just keep the pay good. I don’t want to lose her.”

—

The baby was put to bed, Cara was sprawled out on the large cot, and Din and I were staring at the smaller one skeptically. The area was maybe three feet wide and five high, enough to sit up a little, but stuff hung from the ceiling, taking up some of the precious space. A thin mattress padded the metal beneath.

“It’s meant to sleep a single person,” Din said.

“Maybe you can crawl in first, and I can lay on top of you?” We would be close, very close.

“Sure.” Din squeezed into the cot space, thankfully not wearing any bulky armor. He shifted around until he lay on his back. “Come on in.”

Carefully, I crawled up his body, taking pains not to knee him in the leg or anything. I ended up with my legs on either side of him, my head against his broad chest. Din pressed a button on the wall to close the cot’s door. The position wasn’t entirely uncomfortable, especially when he wrapped his arms around me and held me close.

We lay in silence for several minutes. My heart was pounding, and I wondered if I’d ever be able to sleep. Then, “Are you sniffing my hair?” I asked.

“Sorry. The helmet doesn’t let in much olfactory sensory information, so when I take it off I get overwhelmed sometimes. You smell nice. Sorry.”

“Oh.” Processing this, I fiddled with a button on his shirt.

“I love your hair.” He didn’t try and run his fingers through the curls, for which I was grateful, but he did brush his fingers along them reverently. “I love your clothes—all loose and airy.”

“It’s the style in my village. All the clothes were pinks and browns and the occasional green because those were the dyes available.”

“They look good on you. Too good. You’re irresistible, did you know that?”

My breathing seemed noisy in the close confines of the sealed-off cot. Could he tell how quick it was becoming? I fantasised briefly about making love to him here, pressed close together and fumbling in the small space.

“Can I flip you over?” The question came tense and heady.

“Please.”

Din maneuvered us around somehow so that he was propped up above me. It took some awkward shuffling, and one of my legs was pinned into the wall, but I didn’t mind. “ _Mesh’la_ ,” he breathed. “You’re beautiful.”

“It’s too dark to see me,” I protested.

“I can feel you.” He slid a hand up my thigh, under my long nightshirt, over my breast, and squeezed. The motion pulled up the shirt and bunched it around my waist, showing that I had nothing on underneath. Din ground his hips into mine.

My breath hitched at how hard he was. “Is that beskar in your pants?” I quipped lamely. “Or, or a blaster?”

He hummed in amusement and nipped my ear, still rubbing his erection against me. He didn’t dignify my comments with a response. His sleep pants were softer ones than he normally wore, with elastic around the waist rather than a tie or button. They were delightfully thin, letting me feel in exquisite detail the outline of his cock. “Why don’t you put your hands above your head and just keep them there for me?”

There wasn’t a ton of room, but I lifted my wrists and set them by my head, imagining them tied down with invisible rope. I wouldn’t move until he told me to.

“That’s good.” He rewarded me with a sweet, slow kiss, his tongue darting only shallowly into my mouth. Then he shifted downward, the pressure at my pussy leaving.

No, no! He couldn’t stop now that I was hot all over.

But then he pressed his tongue against my nipple, leaving a wet spot on the loose weave of my nightshirt. He let me flounder for a moment and just watched me shudder, all worked up for him. Covering me again, rubbing against my entrance, he pulled down the front of his pants just an inch, not enough to expose any of his dick. “Let me fuck you.”

“Yes!”

The warmth that was gathering in my belly was nothing to the sharp sear of his cock sliding inside me. I made embarrassing breathy noises that turned to moans as noise leaked out. My body knew what it had been missing. How could I walk around with such an emptiness ever again, knowing how fulfilling it was to be full of him?

“Suffering gods.” Din lifted his head and closed his eyes, seeming in raptures as he pushed his dick further into me with each thrust. “Take it. Just like that, _mesh’la_.”

This feeling of lovely entrapment was exhilarating. The walls pressed close; Din pressed closer. Our clothes chafed as he rocked against me. I clenched my fingers around nothing, wishing I could drag them all over Din’s body.

He moved faster. Both of us were so wound up that we wouldn’t last long. “You give in so easily,” Din said. “I told you to keep your hands there and you agreed, no pushback.”

Had he wanted me to push back? Of course, he was used to snippy Cara who probably never submitted without a fight. “I’m sorry,” I said, bringing my hands back down.

“No.” He gathered my wrists and set them definitively above my head. “It’s nice. It makes me crazy, Meeshla.” He kissed me, then rested his forehead against mine. He was still fucking me, but the pounding of his hips and my veins became background noise. “You make me crazy. You’re so different from anything I’ve known or wanted.” His voice lowered. “I’m not a good man, and I don’t deserve your love, but I’d like it anyway.”

I pictured his face earlier that day and was finally able to identify his expression: yearning.

“Just stay, please, as long as you can. Stay with us.”

“I will, Din.” And I was coming, clenching around his cock until he groaned and finished inside me. That sensation of fullness intensified, then ebbed.

We fell asleep tangled together.


	7. Frog Hunting

** Cara **

Meeshla led the way through the Nevarro marketplace, the baby swaddled and tied facing her chest. He was so wrapped up that his ears were hidden, and the casual observer would have no reason to suspect he was anything but an ordinary human child being carried by its mother.

Din and I drew fewer eyes now, too. Walking behind Meeshla, we looked like bodyguards hired to protect her on her shopping trip.

“Do we have time for one more stop?” Meeshla asked over her shoulder. “I’d like some yarn to make a baby blanket.”

Din glanced at the sun, judging its angle. “We have time.”

“He already has blankets, though,” I said. I mean, watching her dote on the kid was adorable and all, but did she really want to waste all her credits on nonessentials?

“I’m pretty sure all of his current blankets are old capes of Mando’s.”

I glanced at Din, who shrugged.

Meeshla found a vendor and looked through the selection of fibers. She picked out a soft white yarn and haggled for it impressively, even beginning to walk away at one point before the vendor called out a price acceptable to her. She bought several skeins and tucked them into her backpack.

“We should head over to the cantina, now,” Din said. “It’s almost time for our meeting.”

Greef Karga sat at his usual booth, welcoming us with a greeting that could be heard on the Core Worlds. “Mando! Dune! My favorite bounty-hunting duo. And who is this lovely young woman?”

Meeshla took his outstretched hand hesitantly, holding the baby tight with the other. “I’m the new nanny.”

“Please, sit,” Karga said, paying her way too much attention. “Can I offer you a drink?”

“Hey,” I said. “We’re here on business.”

“Of course, of course.” He ushered us to sit across from him in the booth: Meeshla in the corner, then me, then Din on the outside. It was a tight squeeze, but I wasn’t about to sit next to him (or let Meeshla). “So, have you brought back both my quarries?” he asked.

Din laid the pucks on the table. “They’re in the ship.”

“Excellent!” He proceeded to haggle with us over price much as Meeshla had done earlier.

Meeshla, for her part, had taken out one of the skeins of yarn and was crocheting with a technique involving a hooked stick and several of her fingers. That girl didn’t waste any time.

Karga finally deigned to pay us our due bounties, and after Din had pocketed the credits, Karga pulled out three more pucks. “I have a few high-paying jobs here, but you can only have one. Let’s see. There’s one on Coruscant, one on Zakuul, and one on Ryloth. So, where will I be sending you next?”

Din and I exchanged a glance. Was he thinking what I was thinking? Yep. “Zakuul,” we said in unison.

—

“What’s on Zakuul?” Meeshla asked as we descended toward the planet’s surface. She peered through the ship’s viewport at the growing mass of green.

“Swamps,” Din said. “More to the point, amphibious creatures.”

“We’re going frog-hunting!” I said.

Din and I had done this before on this swamp planet and another, and it had been surprisingly fun to catch as many little critters for the baby as we could. Then we would freeze and store them in the ship so that the baby had a fresh supply of snacks. We had been out of them for a while, so this was an excellent opportunity to stock up.

We landed in shallow water in an area mostly clear of trees. Wearing clothes that we didn’t mind getting filthy, the four of us trekked into the swamp. I rolled up my pants and went barefoot. My feet sank into the spongy floor in a way that wasn’t entirely unpleasant.

At the sight of green water, the baby squealed in delight. He wiggled in Meeshla’s arms until she reluctantly set him on the edge of the ship’s ramp. He waddled immediately into the water.

“Wait!” Meeshla yelled, grabbing for him.

Din put a hand on her arm. “He can swim. Just keep a casual eye on him.”

“Are you sure?”

As if in response, the baby ducked underwater then popped up with a frog in his mouth.

“Oh yeah,” I said. “He’s an apex predator here. Aren’t you, little guy?”

The baby swallowed his treat and cooed.

The adults got to work with nets. The baby was the best at finding hidden creatures, and he understood what we were doing enough to get excited about dropping a captured amphibian in the collection bucket. He snacked on them occasionally, but caught far more than he ate.

Meeshla was reluctant to let the baby out of her sight. “What if there are snakes in the water?”

We assured her that we’d fished here before and never seen a snake.

Unconvinced, she followed her gleeful charge around the swamp. “Bean? What’s that in your mouth, Bean?” She waded after him away from the ship.

Din stepped closer to me, looking at Meeshla. “She’s so _cute_ , Cara.” He said it in hushed tones, like sharing a secret. “Do you think she would find that offensive? If I tried to call a Mandalorian woman cute, I would be decked so fast.”

“I don’t think that will be a problem,” I told him, amused at his struggle. He didn’t know how to interact with normal people who weren’t bounty hunters or criminals or warriors trained from childhood. Meeshla was probably worlds different than most women he encountered. “How about me? Would you call me cute?”

He turned toward me. “Depends if you’re in a decking mood.”

“Luckily for you, I’m feeling generous.”

“Then I would say you were a stunning woman, and there’s no one I’d rather have watching my back.”

My heart fluttered stupidly. Dank ferrik, why did he have to say things like that? Wait. My smile fell as the word “watching” triggered another thought. “Where’s Meeshla?”

“You there!” called an unfamiliar voice, emerging from behind a tree—with a blaster at Meeshla’s head. The man prodded her forward. He had a scraggly beard and wore clothes that had seen better days weeks ago. “You have a ship. Are you tourists? I need a way off this gods-forsaken scughole, and… Oh shavit.”

Din and I had spun toward him, unsheathing weapons.

I could actually see the moment he realized that the first member of our party he had encountered was not at all representative of the others. “You aren’t tourists, are you?”

“Nope,” Din said.

“You wouldn’t happen to be named Barshil Offal, would you?” I asked. No, that would be too much of a coincidence that our quarry would find _us_ before we had even started searching.

“Bounty hunters?” he asked.

“Yep,” Din said.

“Kark it all.” He raised his hands.

After we had cuffed him and led him into the _Crest_ , we checked on Meeshla. She was holding the kid and staring into space.

“ _Mesh’la_?” Din put a tentative hand on her shoulder. “Are you okay?”

“I was right,” she said.

“About what?”

She smiled. “There was a snake in the water.”


End file.
